Prognostic significance of nestin expression in patients with resected non-small cell lung cancer treated with platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy; relationship between nestin expression and epithelial to mesenchymal transition related markers

摘要

IntroductionAlthough adjuvant platinum-based chemotherapy (AC) has been shown to improve survival of patients with completely resected stage II and stage IIIA non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), its effect is limited. Nestin is a class VI intermediate filament protein expressed in neural stem cells and several cancer cells including NSCLC. In the present study, we aimed to determine its prognostic significance concerning survival in NSCLC patients receiving AC.